Naughty
by TheLyricsAreMyStory
Summary: Aaron's thoughts following a repeat of his childhood rape. Rated T for dark themes and sexual references.


**Naughty:**

My name is Aaron Livesy. I'm thirteen years old. And last night, it happened again.

I had to find something, something which would allow me to get out of my own head. Transport me away from real life. Hallucinate me from what I face every single day. The bottle of sherry was my only hope, one sharp gulp and I already felt a hint of sanity, normality. So I took another, and another, until I heard the front door slam.

Why was Sandra home? She was supposed to be on evening shifts tonight. I try to conceal it, but she knows, she knows what I had clasped behind my back, leaning up against the mantelpiece in the hallway, my eyes sunken, my hands shaking.

I try to convince myself that I wasn't scared. Sandra was easy for me to handle, she wasn't even my own mother, not that I saw any more of her as it is. But deep down, despite the fact I could bury it away, along with the memories. The brutal, haunting, everlasting memories. I knew deep down I was, I was terrified. Because I knew exactly what was going to happen next, when my dad arrived home, when he walked through the door with a bag of fish and chips, only for his face to fall, cloud with anger once Sandra told him what I had done.

A petty mistake. Turned into a nightmare. Any excuse, any reason for me to step out of line. Most parents would send their child to their room. Ground them. Yell at them. Maybe even slap them. But only my dad would resort to this. Only my dad would have to rape me.

"If you're good. If you're really, really good. It won't happen again."

But I wasn't good. I could try to pretend, but I had grown up influenced by neglect and pain. I was naughty, and that was why I had to be punished.

"Is that your dads best sherry?" Sandra asks me, she has stopped in her tracks as soon as the front door was closed. Eyeing me up, nervously.

"So what if it is?" I slur, shrugging her off in an attempt to scare her away.

"I don't think you'll be saying that when he gets hold of you." She gulps, and the fear in my eyes expresses everything to her. "Upstairs, now."

"I'm not a kid." I lash out, aggression in my voice as I drop the bottle momentarily, the room shrouded in the piercing but satisfying smash of glass, colliding with the floor.

"Aaron, upstairs now." She orders.

"Or what?" I spit at her, edging closer as she backs away.

I don't know whether I would have done it or not; the alcohol had gone straight to my head and I was fuelled with stupidity and anger.

But I never got the chance to find out, because the door opens, knocking Sandra onto the floor as a result of where she had been leant up against it.

"...What the hell is going on?" I remember dad saying, his eyes moving from me to Sandra.

I remember her telling him, pointing to the shattered mess that coated the wooden floor panels.

I remember him dropping the chips on the kitchen counter, breathing a heavy sigh.

I remember him pointing to the staircase, which I immediately obeyed, running upstairs, leaving a trail of mud on the cream carpet from my trainers as I did so.

Then I waited.

I tried to listen to music but the lyrics were just a jumble of letters.

I tried to do breathing exercises but I just felt more suffocated.

I tried to think of a solution, but every thought, every second of waiting, was making it worse.

I was in bed when the door finally creaked open. The room was pitch black, my eyes were wide open. But as the stream of golden light flooded in from the landing, I felt helpless. Despite the empty threats, the kids I had beaten up in the playground, the alcohol, the bruised fists, the smashed mirrors, the sleepless nights, the hatred and the anger. I felt vulnerable. I felt completely lifeless.

The bruises on my arms tell the story. A story no one would ever believe. So I have to keep quiet. I have to keep our little secret. I have to refrain from being naughty again.

"If you're good. If you're really really good, it won't happen again."

But nobody can be good forever.


End file.
